Democratic Sentinel, Volume 3, Number 24, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 July 1879 — The Three R’s. [ARTICLE]

The Three R’s.

Somebody mourns because he has nothing but the three R’s to teach. Poor soul! From the very depths of our feelings we pity you. Nothing to teach! The world is before you. Sun, moon and atoms, stars and comets, a whole universe full, and nothing but the three R’s left you. But after all we suspect you have not taught those branches very much. Can you read? We should like to examine you. How we would try you all the way up from Mother Goose to Milton. Can you write? We would give you a pen, and ten minutes in which to write a thought worth remembering one gecond, Then

arithmetic! Why, my dear, ignorant soul! do you not yet know that arithmetic is the science of sciences, that even the highest calcnlus is only an expanded arithmetic? Go home! Leave your work to others who will honor the grandest of all studies, reading, writing and arithmetic. There are those who understand that to know these well is to be well learned. God bless the teacher who knows the three .It’s! God bless the child who learns them!— Educational Monthly.